White and Other Tales of Ruin

“I’m going with you.”

“Tom, you’re free, Hot Chocolate Bob thinks you’re dead, you can-“

“I’m going with you. I still believe in the Baker. That is, if …”

Honey smiled and to Tom she was beautiful, even after everything. Even her tears.

“How about planting a seed first?” she said. “I need a charge and … well, it’s the least we can do.”

“What do you mean?”

Honey turned back to Skin, who stood leaning against the wall like a petulant child. Tom could see now how he’d been chopped: dazzling blue eyes; perfect designer stubble; a squared jaw which did not suit his face. Vanity personified.

“Doug, does this place still have the buzz units?”

“‘Course it does,” he said. “Did you see the state of some of those artificials out there? Buzzed to fuck and couldn’t care less.”

“We need them.”

“Honey, I can access the net anywhere, we don’t need-“

Honey smiled up at Tom even though she was still leaking tears. She could stop, he knew that, she could control their shedding. But as she’d said before, she so wanted to be human.

“Love’s the answer,” she said, “whatever the question may be. I heard that once. A stupid idea, especially for the likes of me, but it made me jealous.” She stared up the stairwell, seeing nothing there and apparently liking that. “I’ve been a whore for as long as I can remember, Tom. The start of my memory is my creation. Imagine if love stopped the need for plastic bitches like me.”

“The world would be a nicer place.”

She nodded. “And that shithead pimp would be out of business.”

“What the hell are you two robots talking about?” Skin asked. Effectively dismissed by Honey, his anger was rising now, a red-faced attitude burning its way through his altered good-looks. Robots was as derogatory as he could have been.

“We need a buzz unit to bleed Tom’s virus onto the net. And Doug, I need you to let me go. You’ve had your fun. Your time’s up. Let me go.”

Skin looked at Honey, at Tom, back to Honey. There was so much potential in his eyes — for violence, hate and betrayal — but in the end he simply sighed, pulled a small egg-shaped thing from his ear and crunched it under the heel of his boot.

Honey winced slightly, then smiled. “Thank you, Doug.”

“Fucking robots,” Skin muttered as he walked back up the stairs.

Tom watched him go.

“Come on,” Honey said, grabbing his hand. She pushed open a door and they entered a long, dimly lit corridor. “I’ve seen them used a couple of times … I’m sure I can find them.”

Tom was lost. He felt abandoned and loved, led and in charge, alive and dead … artificial and human. He wished the Baker could explain, but he guessed that even the old man would have made little sense of all this. Honey was leading and he was following, and this wasn’t how he had imagined it at all.

“What if the mercenaries find their way down here?” Tom asked. “If they catch Skin they’ll make him talk in seconds.”

“Don’t know,” Honey said. “I suppose that’ll be it.” And that’s all she offered. She was, Tom realised, as out of control as he.

Honey’s mention of needing a charge had started to make him feel weak, as if his muscles and byways and synapses had responded to her words, his bones thinning, his lungs withering. He could hook straight to the net and give them both a clean charge, but Honey’s idea to spread whatever he had — virus, madness, disease — onto the net … well, it was what the Baker had always wanted. Spreading a fire of love. The old man could never have imagined that the smouldering stage would have taken fifteen years.

The corridor twisted and turned, opened up into wider areas, narrowed again, sloped up ramps and down steps dripping with condensation and slime. The basement was the guts of The Slaughterhouse, Tom thought, a maze of rooms which all had closed doors. He was glad for that. This was where the chopping took place, Honey had said. From the extremes he had seen in the club, Tom did not want to know.

“Can you find your way out again?” he asked. Honey paused and glanced back at him. She looked stunned.

“You mean you haven’t been remembering our route?”

“Oh Jesus …”

“Come on,” she said, “I think we’re almost there.”

They must have been way down now, staggering through the depths of the club’s basement. And this far down the club must have felt safe … because some of its doors were still open.

Most of the rooms were empty, full of dank air and dark potential.

Some had rudimentary furnishings, beds in the centre or equipment burnt into a congealed mass in the corners.

A few were occupied.